Asociación para la Conservación de la Cuenta Amazónica - ACCA

We are a Peruvian nonprofit organization that, since 1999, has the mission of integrating science, innovation and communities to conserve the Peruvian Amazon and Andes, one of the most diverse ecosystems on the planet. We focus our work in the field with an integrated approach centered on training people to be future conservationists, to improve a sustainable quality of life of stakeholders, and to protect natural areas by using the latest scientific and technological discoveries in the field of conservation. Our ultimate goal is to protect natural ecosystems, and to achieve sustainable management of natural resources in the most diverse ecosystem of the planet. We operate from 3 offices in Lima, Cusco and Madre de Dios and we own and operate three world-class biological stations that act as the conservation hubs: Wayqecha, located in the upper cloud forest on the edge of the Andean highlands at an altitude of 2,900 meters above sea level. The station is surrounded by cloud forest, scrub forest, and grasslands. Manu (fka Villa Carmen), located in the foothills of the Andes where two rivers meet to form the Madre de Dios river, the beginning of the Amazon lowland rainforest. Los Amigos, now a famous research station that Russ Mittermeier, then at CI, helped fund 20 years ago. Since then, it has trained thousands of students including our Ex Minister of Environment Fabiola Muñoz and is a world class location for field studies in conservation biology. It also provides direct protection of a key part of the southwest Amazon connecting Manu National Park to the Tambopata National Reserve, forming a large natural corridor. Los Amigos protects three major terrestrial habitats of the region: lowland forest, floodplains, and wetlands. It also borders the Madre de Dios Territorial Reserve, a critical protected area for the protection of indigenous peoples in voluntary isolation, one of the last of its kind.